On the 15th Birthday of the World Wide Web, a Look Back

ArsTechnica looks back: “In November of 1990, Tim Berners-Lee, a researcher at Europe’s CERN Particle Physics Laboratory, invented the very first web server and web browser. The server, entitled simply httpd, and the browser, called WorldWideWeb, ran on Tim’s NeXT cube and worked exclusively on the NeXTstep operating system. Archive copies of Tim’s first web page and some early web sites show a web that is simultaneously very different from the modern one and yet still very familiar.”

The internet was derived from ARPAnet, the US Military network, however, http protocol and www comes from CERN and Berners-Lee.

Saying that “internet == http” is indeeed very narrowminded… ttbomk, neither irc, ftp, ssh, smtp or other services runs through http (not nescessarily at least). http runs through one (uno, ein, en, 1) port… that leaves more than 60,000 other ports free to use for internet services other than http. So please, _don’t_ use that “internet == http” thing.

Now that one is wrong. The Internet is NOT derived from ARPAnet, however ARPAnet is a part of the Internet.

The Internet is a combination of several networks including the ARPAnet. ARPAnet was not the predecessor to the Internet, but merely a network later to be integrated into what became known as the Internet.

2005-11-05 8:43 pm

Tim Berners-Lee was recently interviewed by the BBC. From the start he was pretty vague and evasive. Hardly the critical thinker he came over as being a few years ago. I’m not sure if this is because he doesn’t want to get painted into a corner, or if he’s coasting on reputation.

I’ve got to say, for the first time in my life, I developed an instant and strong dislike for this man, and felt a little betrayed by his lack of enthusiasm and sharp insights. I got the feeling this was a man swimming in a cesspool of politics and vested interests to the point where he’d lost sight of himself.

A retrospective is fine, but there comes a point where it starts becoming an introspective. Doing that inevitably causes a loss of momentum, blunting and, eventually, destroying the capacity to look forward and embrace new challenges, which might help explain why the symantic web remains vapourware.

Tim Berners-Lee developed his original idea in the energetic freedom of CERN, not the smug and corrupt corridors of American politics. If Tim is to have any hope of saving himself, or of moving the web in more interesting directions, he might like to consider taking a holiday to escape himself and the vested interests. If someone at CERN would offer Tim his old job back, perhaps, this strange attractor may encourage Tim to come full circle and create another cosmic firework.

Also try to see this in the light of a recent slashdot article, about Ted Nelson and his Xanadu project. Xanadu is an alternative for the www which Nelson is trying to bring to the foreground for the past 30 years.

Actually a german engineer named Konrad Zuse created the first true computer.

One could argue that Charles Babbage did so, but that was an analogue computer and not a digital computer. Besides, he didn’t succeed in construting it, due to too high demands compared with the available technology at that moment.

But it did work, and it was completed by his son or grandson.

But the first digital computer was invented by a german (and no, I’m not german).

2005-11-07 6:23 pm

While Babbage’s analytical engine was not a binary computer it was most certainly digital.

It is interesting in that Babbage’s proposed analytical engine though mechanical and powered by steam anticipated the modern comptuer better than some of the early electronic computing machines.

2005-11-06 4:23 am

Americans are som ignorant they probably think they’re the first to invent being the first. They’re not. Feudal Chinese Warlords were at that trick a few thousand years ago. And it was done for the same reasons Americans do it. Propoganda to make everyone think they’re the best. I guess violence and a big mouth go hand in hand.

It’s so fashionable to put Americans down. Making generalized statements about them just makes you look as ignorant as you claim Americans to be. What has your country done that makes it so much better?

But we won’t brag around for these minor improvements all day, because we’re used to invent new stuff for the last 2000 years.

2005-11-06 9:08 am

Europe also colectively invented the telephone (an italian got there before alaxander graham bell), the car, modern fabrics, the bicycle and just about every single modern day invention except for two:

* Powdered milk

* The TV – a scotsman invented an analogue TV, but the America invented a much better all electric version themselves at the same time.

The first digital programmable computer known is the Collossus, a huge tape-programmed device used to crack the German Enigma cypher in 1943. It could read data on punch tape up to 30 miles an hour. Due to its use in the war it was classified afterwards and America claimed to invent the computer a decade later.

ARPAnet was invented in USA, but the Internet is a combination of several international nets and several US nets.

ARPAnet != Internet

The Internet is a result of world wide co-operation. Some parts were created by US engineers and other parts were created by engineers from other countries.

No country can claim to have invented the Internet. No state can claim such.

Humanity can however claim to have invented the Internet.

Next thing is probably that USA invented the wheel

2005-11-06 10:38 am

“Every” modern day invention is not invented by one single person. The telephone is credit to Meucci also to Bell. Meucci thought of the idea, took what he knew turned it into a raw form of the telephone. Sold it to a telegraph company, they got Bell to improve upon it. So without Meucci AND Bell you wouldn’t have the phone you know today.

The vehicle was invented in a raw form by Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot. A steamed power mass basicly. Then was touched upon by many other inventors. The internal combustion engine is credited to Benz and Daimler. Without all these people you wouldn’t have the vehicles you know today.

Modern Fabrics? Give me a break. First sign of knitted fabrics was found in Egyptian tombs dated to 3rd and 6th Centuries AD. There were many inventions of Knitting machines which laid way to modern fabrics. No way one person can lay claim to Modern Fabrics with a history that long.

The bicycle is credited to Karl von Drais. BUT It was an idea by Leonardo da Vinci. Many people ran with this idea.

Powerdered Milk invented by Mongols. No one person is known to lay claim since it was first found in writing in 1275.

The television CAN NOT be credited to anyone person. Simply because it took ideas from 3 inventors for Logie Baird to show “simple faces” But infact if you want to know who first showed any type of picture it would be Farnsworth who showed some sort of picture.

The Colossus computer was classified but my bet many people from Allied forces had a hand in it.

All in all almost every invention turns out to be someone else’s invention to.

The telephone is credit to Meucci also to Bell. Meucci thought of the idea, took what he knew turned it into a raw form of the telephone. Sold it to a telegraph company, they got Bell to improve upon it. So without Meucci AND Bell you wouldn’t have the phone you know today.

And the funny thing is that Bell was from Scotland originally.

2005-11-07 1:49 pm

>The Colossus computer was classified but my bet many people from Allied forces had a hand in it.

I don’t think so – it appears it was pretty much the brainchild of one man: Tommy Flowers. Flowers worked for the GPO (General Post Office, telecom company), and used spare parts from the phone exchange to build Colussus. Aparantly he found it very difficult to get official support for the project and had to fund the development himself. At the end of the war he was given a cash award in recognition of his efforts which barely compensated him for his expenses.

Also most US government systems come from Europe (Romans specifically) – senators, capitol hill (from Capitole – centre of the world), constitution, forum, capitolism, republic, federalism – ever noticed how Roman all US government architecture is? Also, the Romans were also notorious for continually sewing each other (so the US didn’t even invent that)!

Hell you don’t even have your own language – you got that from the Brits!